Originally Posted By: NoNameJoe
Originally Posted By: javacontour
If the consumer wanted high MPG vehicles, they would buy them. There would be no need for such a regulation if that's what people wanted.
Sorry, that kind of argument can be applied to anything. Like if we wanted a crime free world, humans wouldn't commit crimes, but they still do. "People" are incredibly stupid and emotional, that requires people who are smart enough to be the ones to make decisions. There isn't anything authoritarian about this, nothing is stopping anyone from being educated to make those decisions. If the government gets a group of scientists together and their conclusion is that X needs to be done and explains the reason why, I'll give them more credit than Joe Blow who doesn't like regulation because everything is fake news, sorry.
And people should be free to be as stupid as they wish to be. And people should not be expected to mitigate the consequences they face by spreading them around to others.
If you fail to finish high school because you make bad choices shouldn't entitle one to a lifetime of government handouts.
People both left and right cite "the greater good" but fail to tell you that it's THEIR vision of the greater good that must be followed and all others are stupid, dangerous, or however they would judge it.
The right said banning same sex marriage was for the greater good. The left says banning so-called assault weapons is for the greater good as they see it.
In a free nation, one doesn't get to apply the greater good standard to impose values on others.
Sure, people are stupid. So what? We are a free people and if we want to be stupid, as long as we are not harming another, we should be free to be as stupid as our time, talent and treasure allow.
But, we are also responsible for any harm we cause. We are not allowed to shift the consequences of our choices to others.
Your comparison to crime makes no sense. If we wanted a crime free world, I wouldn't commit crimes to do that. But I cannot choose how another acts. And in a free society, why should I? But, if someone steals from me, and I prove it, there should be compensation. I should be made whole.
It's up to the scientists you mention to make a credible case and CONVINCE people to choose to act. It shouldn't be mandated.
If you want people to remain dumb, just have government mandate and sheeple follow. If you want to address the dumb people, start making the case for smarter action and stop shifting the consequences of stupidity to others.
That might mean the costs of fuel rise to address the costs of the military that secures the world so that peaceful trade exists.
I think that's a far more rational and fair means of addressing the issue than merely setting some arbitrary standard and saying because it's for the greater good, we should do it.
And let people decide for themselves if they want to keep driving something that gets 10MPG or drive 30 miles one-way to go out to dinner, or whatever they choose.
The answer will be different for everybody, which is preferable to one answer from DC.
Regulation isn't a pancea. It can distort markets and freeze out smaller players who can't afford the regulatory burden. Large corporations like regulation because they are better equipped to deal with it compared to small upstarts.
Originally Posted By: NoNameJoe
Regulation is necessary, it should be in moderation and it should drive us toward the greater good. I bet nobody wanted to talk about the awful EPA and government interference when it came to phasing out leaded gasoline. If the EPA wants to regulate fuel mileage to decrease pollution and reduce energy dependence, I'm not complaining. Some brands are doing things I don't like to eek out every last MPG and some brands are.
When governments don't regulate, you get GM "innovating" with leaded gasoline. I'd rather get the Mazda's of the world innovating with compression ignition and new SkyActiv technologies. I'm not convinced we'd get new, cleaner tech if companies weren't forced to try.
Quote:
He found a couple of additives that did work, however, and lead was just one of them. Iodine worked, but producing it was much too complicated. Ethyl alcohol also worked, and it was cheap–however, anyone with an ordinary still could make it, which meant that GM could not patent it or profit from it. Thus, from a corporate point of view, lead was the best anti-knock additive there was.
In February 1923, a Dayton filling station sold the first tankful of leaded gasoline. A few GM engineers witnessed this big moment, but Midgeley did not, because he was in bed with severe lead poisoning. He recovered; however, in April 1924, lead poisoning killed two of his unluckier colleagues, and in October, five workers at a Standard Oil lead plant died too, after what one reporter called “wrenching fits of violent insanity.” (Almost 40 of the plant’s workers suffered severe neurological symptoms like hallucinations and seizures.)
Still, for decades auto and oil companies denied that lead posed any health risks. Finally, in the 1970s, the Environmental Protection Agency required that carmakers phase out lead-compatible engines in the cars they sold in the United States. Today, leaded gasoline is still in use in some parts of Eastern Europe, South America and the Middle East.
Yeah...it's a pity the EPA wanted to burden American companies from making a lot of money.
I could write more, but I have to go to work so that I can pay 37% in combined marginal income and payroll taxes at the state and federal level. Perhaps I could get some relief from this outsized burden and I might be more amenable to a government that claims to be working for my "greater good." Right now, it seems I'm being worked for someone else's vision of the greater good.
